The house system is an essential part of the British schools worldwide. At BSS Plovdiv we now have 3 houses and you may have already learned about House Romans. The second house that we’d like to present to you is House Vikings. Their emblem is the traditional Nordic dragon boat (drakkar) and the Lord of the House is Mr. Rosen Kukosharov.

It is the superiority and versatility of these seafaring vessels that brought half the world to their knees before the might of the Viking tribes. Vikings are not simply fierce warriors and conquerors, despite of the Hollywood’s extremely wrong depiction of them. Where ever they go, they bring with them trade, culture and civilization, even to the New World, a couple of centuries before Columbus. All of these possible due to their boats. This emblem can be incorporated in the lessons in various ways. For example:

• Topic based learning. In the Primary School some of the subjects follow certain topics from the Cambridge curriculum. One of them is “Push me – pull you”. There the children learn about travel, movement and means of transportation. All of those are represented by the Viking ship.
• Holistic education. Albeit not a subject by itself, the holistic education at BSS Plovdiv strives towards developing the spiritual, moral, social and cultural capacity of the children. As the Vikings were great explorers and traders, they influenced many cultures around the world and appropriated some of the newly learned. Therefore, their example can be used during the entirety of the schooling process as such.
• PSHD. As a part of the Physical Social and Health Development (PSHD) subject, the students at BSS Plovdiv learn monetary literacy. Vikings were great traders and Nordic coins are found all around Europe, some parts of Asia and Africa and even in North America. From these facts stem a plethora of questions and answers about, e.g., exchange rates, basic trading skills, etc.

However, not only the symbolism and academics behind the emblem are important. It is easily sketched by young children by simply depicting a boat with a sail. The color code is red, since it means energy, passion and aggression, all of which perfectly depicting the Viking culture and therefore the House Vikings.